I need to get out of Provo, but where to live next?

It’s been almost six months since I moved back out to Provo, and I don’t think I’ll be staying here much longer.  It’s a great place if you’re a Mormon college student in your early twenties, or married with kids and looking for a nice, quiet place to settle down, but for everything in between it’s just not the greatest.

So where am I going to go next?  Honestly, I don’t have a clue.  Probably somewhere in the United States, but I’m not ruling out the possibility of another overseas adventure.  In fact, that’s exactly the sort of thing that I’d love.

But I’ve got to be honest here: I came back to the States mostly to find a girl.  I don’t know about getting married or not–that’s like step twenty-five, while I’m still on step three–but I do know that next time I go overseas, I want to go with someone, preferably someone special.  That’s what I learned while I was living in the Caucasus mountains, that an adventure is like ten times better when you have someone to share it with.

I may be opening up a little bit in this post, and I don’t want to give the wrong impression to the people I know who read it.  It’s not that I’m uninterested in any of my female friends here, but so far, nothing has really worked out.  Some of that is because I’m not as interested as I thought I was, but the reverse is probably just as true.  Nothing wrong with that, and I still value all of my friendships.  And hey, you never know–things can always change.  But when you start to get sick of a place, that’s probably a good time to move on.

So what am I looking for?  Ideally, a place with a lot of Mormons in their late twenties / early thirties, most of them young professionals or recent graduates.  A place with a decent art scene, or that sort of vibe to it, where I can meet up with other artists / entrepreneurs like myself and be a part of that community.  I really want to live in a place with mountains–my sister is moving to a town just out of Des Moines, and omigosh just from looking it up on Google Earth I know I could never live there.  Barring that, I really love deserts, so I wouldn’t mind living in Arizona or New Mexico.

I’ve heard good things about Salt Lake City, so that’s pretty high on the list.  I’ve got a couple of friends up that way, and lots of family as well.  Other than that, I wonder if Saint George or Cedar City might be good places for a guy in my situation to live.  I really love Utah, so if I could find another place out here besides Provo, that would be ideal.  Moab, perhaps?  Seems like a tourist town more than anything.  Though if I could score a job at a hostel out there, that could be a lot of fun.

Texas is also fairly high on the list.  Beautiful place, Texas.  I’ve always loved driving through that country.  Lots of Mormons too, apparently, though where I’d want to go exactly, I have no idea.

One place I absolutely do not want to go is Washington DC.  I HATE that place, especially after my internship experience.  It’s a great place to visit, and the museums and cultural stuff are amazing, but I never want to live there again.

Other than that … I’ve got a couple of friends who suggested Portland, but I dunno.

And honestly, a not insignificant part of me wants to go somewhere crazy, like Mongolia or the Czech Republic, or even back to Georgia.  I’m making enough on my book sales right now that I could probably get a small apartment in Tbilisi and support myself entirely off of my ebook royalties alone.  Better yet, I could arrange a long-term boarding situation back in the village, or out in Kutaisi, or maybe even up in Svaneti … but that’s probably just me missing the place.  I miss it almost every day.

All I know for sure is that I absolutely cannot stay here in Provo much longer.  If I do, I’ll either go crazy or get old and fat and complacent, and I’m not sure which is worse.  I’ll stay here through the summer, just to save up some money, but when September comes around, I am getting out of here.